Wednesday, 30 November 2011

Finding strength in numbers - Pacific stands firm with AOSIS

AOSIS meeting

Durban, South Africa, 30 November 2011 - Pacific delegations present at the United Nations Climate Change Conference, COP17, currently underway in Durban are standing firm with the Alliance of Small Island States on key positions under negotiation.

“We must be solid in what we do and continue to advocate that on climate change issues we should remain together,” urged the President of Kiribati from his island home at the forefront of the impacts of climate change in the Pacific.

Fourteen Pacific island countries are represented at COP17 under the banner of the Alliance of Small Island States (AOSIS). They are the Cook Islands, Fiji, Federated States of Micronesia, Kiribati, Marshall Islands, Nauru, Niue, Palau, Papua New Guinea, Samoa, Solomon Islands, Tonga, Tuvalu and Vanuatu.

The Kyoto Protocol must live on

In collaboration with other island nation members of AOSIS from Africa, Caribbean, Indian Ocean, Mediterranean and South China Sea, the Pacific joined the grouping in consolidating the call for strong decisions around the Kyoto Protocol.

“We must adopt a decision that establishes a 5-year second commitment period under the Kyoto Protocol, to run from 2013 to 2017, with a single, legally-binding, base year of 1990, as part of a two-track outcome,” said a statement from AOSIS.

“This two track outcome must include the adoption of a mandate to negotiate a legally-binding instrument under the Ad hoc Working Group on Long-term Cooperative Action under the Convention (AWG-LCA) with negotiations to be concluded by December 2012.

“This timeframe is needed to ensure legally-binding commitments and actions from all major emitters commencing on January 1, 2013.”

The Kyoto Protocol is an international agreement that sets binding targets for 37 industrialised countries and the European community for reducing greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions over the five-year period 2008-2012.

“Durban must deliver an ambitious outcome with three essential elements,” said the AOSIS statement, including “certainty that there will be a second commitment period of the Kyoto Protocol with an enhanced set of rules to strengthen its environmental integrity.

“We must have a “Durban Mandate” to capture the work of the AWG-LCA in the form of a new, legally binding protocol next year at COP18.”

AOSIS called on the new instrument to complement the Kyoto Protocol with binding mitigation commitments for non-Kyoto Parties and mitigation actions for developing countries, as well as address all other elements of the Bali Action Plan.

UNFCCC COP 19

The 19th Conference of the Parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change is held in Warsaw, Poland from 11 to 22 November.

All 14 Pacific island countries are represented at these climate negotiations.

About AOSIS

The Alliance of Small Island States (AOSIS) is a coalition of small island and low-lying coastal countries that share similar development challenges and concerns about the environment, especially their vulnerability to the adverse effects of global climate change. It functions primarily as an ad hoc lobby and negotiating voice for small island developing States (SIDS) within the United Nations system.

AOSIS has a membership of 44 States and observers, drawn from all oceans and regions of the world: Africa, Caribbean, Indian Ocean, Mediterranean, Pacific and South China Sea. Thirty-seven are members of the United Nations, close to 28 percent of developing countries, and 20 percent of the UN’s total membership. Together, SIDS communities constitute some five percent of the global population.

Member States of AOSIS work together primarily through their New York diplomatic Missions to the United Nations. AOSIS functions on the basis of consultation and consensus. Major policy decisions are taken at ambassadorial-level plenary sessions. The Alliance does not have a formal charter. There is no regular budget, nor a secretariat. With the Permanent Representative of Saint Lucia as its current chairman, AOSIS operates, as it did under previous chairmanships, out of the chairman’s Mission to the United Nations.